Magnetic locks, which employ tumbler pins supported intermediate their ends for pivotal movement and a locking plate having openings arranged to receive adjacently disposed ends of such tumbler pins when opposite ends thereof are attracted by permanent magnet devices carried by a key, are presently well known in the patent art, as evidenced by U.S. Pat. Nos. 428,247; 3,056,276; 3,657,907 and 3,857,262.
In these prior constructions, when the tumbler pins are attracted they automatically align themselves with both their attracting magnet device and the respective openings of the locking plate into which their ends are to be inserted. Manufacturing considerations dictate that the number of well defined possible combination setting positions of each tumbler pin be determined by the possible number of locking plate openings, which can be accommodated without substantial overlapping along a circular path whose center is aligned with the point about which the tumbler pin pivots. Thus, with this arrangement, when it is desired to increase the possible number of combination setting positions of the tumbler pin, it is necessary to increase theh radius of the circular path. A drawback of this construction is that as the radius increases, the magnetically attracted end of the tumbler pin must swing further and further away from the key in which its associated magnet device is imbedded with the result that the tumbler pin is less and less influenced by the magnetic field established by such magnet device. For any given construction, this sets a definite limit on the possible number of well defined combination setting positions of the tumbler pin. Moreover, with this construction, the tumbler pin is subject to vibration induced misalignments with respect to its associated opening of the locking plate, particularly under weak magnetic field conditions.